Stoneleigh Abbey

Gentle Readers: Today I welcome Chris Sandrawich, from the Midlands Branch of the Jane Austen Society. This is based on a talk he gave at Stoneleigh Abbey in 2014, and the essay has just recently been published in the Midlands annual publication Transactions. There are really three separate topics to his talk so I will be posting it in three parts over the next few days. And it is all about Mansfield Park! If you have any comments or questions for Chris, please do leave a reply and he will get back to you.

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Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park and Stoneleigh Abbey

by Chris Sandrawich

Outline: This article is based around a short presentation I gave at Stoneleigh Abbey in 2014. Mansfield Park is by common consent amongst the world’s leading literary academics one of the greatest novels ever written. Just like Emma and Persuasion, Mansfield Park was written in Jane Austen’s maturity around 1813 and published 200 years ago when Jane was 38 years old. She published it on commission rather than for a fee and it sold out in six months raising £330. So, she made rather more with this book than the others. Possibly £300,000 in today’s values, but I will say more about the comparative values of money later.

As a callow youth I found Fanny Price to be an insipid, weak character who compared badly in my youthful eyes with the feisty and far sexier Elizabeth Bennet, (who is everything to me that Darcy is to many women) and so Mansfield Park was not my favourite novel. However, with the years I have discovered that Fanny Price is every bit as immovably tough as Lady Catherine de Bourgh found Lizzy Bennet to be. Both leading ladies display fierce determination and firm convictions when they think they are right. Also, it is important to note that Mary Crawford is every bit as sexy and attractive as Elizabeth Bennet and so Jane Austen by setting Mary and Fanny in undeclared competition for Edmund is showing that the real heroine of the novel to win true love does not have to be the most glamorous person in it. Fanny Price has grown on me, and liking Fanny is the key to liking the novel which is still ranked very low in most Janeites’ favourites’ list.

George Crabbe by Pickersgill – wikipedia

“Fanny Price” is also the name given to the heroine in the Parish Register by George Crabbe (above) published in 1807. Fanny in Crabbe’s poem resists the sexual advances of an amorous knight by remaining “meekly firm”, and it seems too similar in its basic plot for Jane Austen’s choice of name for her heroine not to have been deliberate.

I could write a book on the ideas and topics emerging from this great work and so regretfully many interesting aspects, to be found in the novel are omitted from this paper. With regret this includes Lovers’ Vows, but I will discuss in detail:

Links with both Stoneleigh Abbey and Cottesbrook Hall in Northamptonshire

Jane Austen’s fascination with money and inheritance in her novels, and Stoneleigh Abbey’s importance in this

Consider the influence of Shakespeare directly and indirectly on the novel’s plot and structure

Look at one of Mansfield Park’s characters and touch on a few of the others

General Remarks:

Here are a few preliminary points about Mansfield Park to get a context for this great work:

The novel covers the greatest period in years of any of Jane Austen’s six novels as it begins when Fanny is only nine years old and we see her develop and eventually marry her cousin Edmund in her late teens or early twenties. As Jane Austen says, “I purposely abstain from dates . . . . . . .” and so she allows us to have our own ideas on how long it takes exactly for Edmund to get over the scintillating, beautiful, and all-too-charming Mary Crawford.
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By naming the novel Mansfield Park and by giving the owner of it an interest in the slave trade and by making the

Lord Mansfield – wikipedia

building modern and therefore likely to have been built from the profits of slavery (about one pound in every three of the UK economy of that period was reckoned to arise from the slave trade) is Jane Austen drawing a reference to the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Mansfield? Lord Mansfield made a significant contribution to the abolition of the slave trade by his famous ruling on the runaway slave James Somerset; that no man living on English soil could be a slave. Paula Byrne has written a biography on Mansfield’s adopted daughter Dido Elizabeth Belle adapted for a film, and has an article on Mansfield Park in a July 2014’s Daily Telegraph. Certainly there are lots of parallels to be drawn in the raising of Dido Belle and Fanny Price, both taken from their families, adopted and raised in a mansion but with doubtful status: are they servant or lady?

Dido Elizabeth Belle and

The influences of the country and cities on forming character and shaping behaviour are well drawn. The fateful tainting of the Crawfords’ morals arising from living with the Admiral in Hill Street and by adopting values of their rich set of friends in London mean that in the end they lose their chances of marrying Edmund and Fanny.
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Especially in “Fanny’s nest of comforts” but in many other ways the transfer of the possession of things highlight how material objects can be viewed and valued very differently by different people.
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Eliza de Feuillide -wikipedia

Despite Sir Thomas and Fanny being against the acting of plays at home, these opinions are not meant to reflect Jane Austen’s views of the theatre. Whilst Jane Austen was negotiating the publication of this novel and staying with her brother Henry in London her letters show she was constantly at the theatre. She loved seeing all sorts of live performance and plays and she followed the star performers’ lives with a keen interest. Also the whole Austen family engaged in the production of stage plays at home in their barn at Steventon, with a juvenile Jane Austen turning the weighty novel Sir Charles Grandison into a crisp five act play. In 1787 (Jane was only 11 years old) the Austens were joined by their exotic cousin Eliza de Feuillide, a French Countess, and both James and Henry were rivals for Eliza’s affections and Henry married her some ten years later. It seems too good an association of ideas not to conjecture that the flirtations Jane must have witnessed at close hand reappear in Henry Crawford’s behaviour with both Julia and Maria in Mansfield Park and Lovers Vows. Two centuries ago, most writers wrote plays and everyone was familiar with the theatre, and the revealing of character through dialogue – which is so brilliantly displayed in Jane Austen’s novels – owes much to her understanding of how plays are constructed as well as performed.

Stoneleigh Abbey, the home of the Leigh Family, has direct links to two of Jane Austen’s novels and indirect links to them all. The physical appearance of the Abbey has reverberating echoes for Northanger Abbey. Stoneleigh Abbey was maintained and added to over time by the wealth of the Leigh family and has an odd mix of styles: it has an Elizabethan East Wing, an 18 th Century West Wing and a 14th Century Gate House. Its rooms are altogether lighter and more colourful than one might expect – and one can easily imagine Catherine Morland having to swallow her disappointment at the shortage of Gothic Horrors. Just how far we can go to claiming that Stoneleigh Abbey as the model for Northanger Abbey is aided by the existence of a now concealed staircase leading from the stable yard that might have been the model for Henry Tilney to ascend and surprise Catherine when she was seeking Mrs Tilney’s bedroom. What is more credible, however, is the chapel at Stoneleigh Abbey being the model for the chapel at Sotherton Court in Mansfield Park. From the vantage point of the chapel balcony one sees, “the profusion of mahogany and the crimson velvet cushions appearing over the ledge of the family balcony above” and as Fanny Price noted, “no aisles, no inscription, no banners.”

Stoneleigh Abbey Chapel – austenonly

Mr Rushworth is keen to improve his home using Humphrey Repton, the only developer cited by name in any of the novels. Repton was employed at Stoneleigh Abbey in 1808, and he foreshadowed nineteenth century developments, creating a perfect cricket pitch called ‘home lawn’ in front of the west wing and a bowling green lawn between the gatehouse and the house. Repton worked on over 60 great and small houses in England. It is not right to think Jane Austen was not interested in sports. The earliest mention of “Baseball” appears in Northanger Abbey.

Jane Austen came to Stoneleigh Abbey in 1806 with her sister and Mother (who was related to the Leigh family as was the Reverend Edward Cooper, at Hamstall Ridware, who gained two livings from the Leigh family. Edward and Jane were cousins because their mothers were sisters and granddaughters of Theophilus Leigh of Adlestrop.) The Austens had been staying with The Reverend Thomas Leigh (Mrs Austen’s cousin) in Adlestrop and upon hearing of the death of their relative The Honorable Mary Leigh travelled for a family gathering at Stoneleigh Abbey. Later they travelled further north to stay with the Coopers. Jane Austen stayed for some time in Stoneleigh Abbey, admired the rooms and views from their windows and strolled through the grounds.

We can get an understanding of just what the Austen’s thought of and did at Stoneleigh Abbey by looking at two letters from Mrs Austen. The first is a description of the house:

There are 45 windows in front (which is quite strait with a flat roof) 15 in a row. You go up a considerable flight of stairs (some offices are under the house) into a large hall: on the right hand the dining parlour, within [ie beyond] that the breakfast room, where we generally sit, and reason good ‘tis the only room (except the chapel) that looks towards the river. On the left hand of the hall is the best drawing room, within that a smaller. These rooms are rather gloomy brown wainscoat and dark crimson furniture; so we never use them but to walk thro’ them to the old picture gallery. Behind the smaller drawing room is the state bed chamber, with a high dark crimson velvet bed: an alarming apartment just fit for a heroine; the old gallery opens into it; behind the hall and parlours is a passage all across the house containing three staircases and two small back parlours, There are 25 bed chambers in the new part of the house & a great many (some say good ones) in the old. There is another gallery fitted with modern prints on buff paper & a large billiard-room.

The second a description of what she had for breakfast: “Chocolate, Coffee and Tea, Plumb Cake, Pound Cake, Hot Rolls, Cold Rolls, Bread and Butter and Dry Toast.”

Now if like me you scratch your head at the mention of a Pound Cake here is a description of how to bake one by the Austen’s friend, Martha Lloyd:

Take a lb of fine flour well dried. Then take a lb of butter and work it well with your hands till it is soft. Then work into it half a lb of sugar. Then take twelve eggs, putting away half the whites, then work them also into your butter and sugar. Then strew your flour into your butter, sugar and eggs, by little and little, till all be in, then strew in 2 oz of caraway seeds. Butter your pan and bake it in a quick oven, – an hour and a half will bake it.

“You know how interesting the purchase of a sponge-cake is to me.”[Jane at Godmersham to Cassandra in Southampton, 15th June 1808.] From this we see an interest in “cakes” shared by many in the Austen family.

Now Jane would have been familiar with Stoneleigh Abbey, by name, from a very young age as well as the complicated Leigh family and its connections. Preferment and the importance of kinship would have been known to Jane Austen as both her elder brothers James and Henry received educations at St John’s College Oxford as they were “Founder’s Kin.” Jane would have been introduced over time to the importance of inheritance on the lives of families. Her novels are full of it. Let’s take the first two for example. In Pride and Prejudice the Bennet estate is entailed away from the daughters to “heirs male”, favouring Mr Collins, to Mrs Bennet’s eternal bafflement. As a reaction to this entail, her constant drive is to see all the Bennet ladies married well. Sense and Sensibility begins with a death and the disinheritance from their home of a man’s second wife and three daughters in favour of the eldest son from his first marriage. In both examples the poor treatment of females, as well to a lesser extent of second sons, in this inheritance merry-go-around would seem quite deliberate, to highlight this issue.

The importance of money and livings on family life brought through kinship was a subject familiar to Jane Austen and even though her Mother’s and therefore her own chances of inheriting anything significant amongst the numerous Leighs was slight; the family living and invitations to visit relatives at great houses and to mix with the wealthy and connected in society gave Jane Austen a colourful and varied lifestyle. The view that she lived obscurely in a village and saw nobody but her immediate family is well wide of the mark. Jane Austen, largely through the Leigh family connection, but also through her brother Edward who inherited through adoption the Knight family income and had more money than “Darcy”, travelled and stayed away a great deal and met and mixed with many much wealthier than she was. Jane observed them all and later when writing her novels drew upon her wide experience and never lost sight of the importance of money.

Austen Topaz crosses

An example of Jane using her own experiences in her novels is illustrated by having William Price with brotherly love buying an Amber Cross for Fanny. Jane’s own brother, Charles in the Royal Navy as part of his £50 prize money from the taking of a privateer bought Cassandra and Jane topaz crosses as well as suitable chains for them. Jane showed she was much taken with this handsome gesture of affection by working it into Mansfield Park. However, Jane then goes further by using William’s gift of an amber cross for Fanny as a plot device. William could not afford the chain as well only being a midshipman. We witness the machinations of Mary and Henry in trying to get Fanny to wear Henry’s chain for her new cross.

A Short Aside on Money:

Money has its importance in the novels but how are we to understand the value represented in Jane Austen’s day with our experience? Fifty pounds does not seem to be a great deal as a share for taking a “prize”. I offer you three means of making a comparison each as solid or unreliable as any other. Economists rule this area of expertise and we may recall what George Bernard Shaw said about them, “If all the economists in the world were laid end to end they still would not reach a conclusion.”

By looking at bundles of commodities over short time periods for 200 years we end up with a movement in the RPI of around 60 x and so the purchasing power in today’s terms of Charles’ £50 is £3,000. Alternatively, if we look at the movement in earnings over the last two centuries we can increase this value over 800 x and so Charles’ £50 becomes £40,000. As a piece of whimsy I offer you a “Beef Index” as well. Picking just one commodity is fraught with danger, of course. Louis Simond quotes in his excellent journal of a tour of the British Isles in 1810/11 that beef cost 9d (old money) a pound. Well there is beefsteak and beefsteak and quite a range of prices and qualities in today’s supermarkets. But uprating to the mid-values gives us 250 x and so Charles’ £50 is worth £12,500 in beef purchasing power. Of course different commodities give different results. Tea in Jane Austen’s time was kept under lock and key and at £1 a pound it was almost 30 times more expensive than beef and if it had maintained that price a pound of tea would cost well over £300 today. Supermarkets might like those prices but we don’t. If you are scratching your heads at these comparisons I refer you to George Bernard Shaw’s remark on economists and conclusions.

Cottesbrooke Hall

Almost all of what I have to say on Cottesbrooke Hall is gleaned from Julie Wakefield’s excellent AustenOnly website. Cottesbrooke Hall in Northamptonshire has its fans amongst the great and the good as the model for Mansfield Park. About the same time Jane Austen was composing Mansfield Park she wrote to her sister Cassandra and to her close friend Martha Lloyd asking for information about the landscape of Northamptonshire, even down to hedgerows. It is extremely unlikely that Jane Austen went into Northamptonshire but “she knew a man that did”, her brother Henry who was familiar with the house, the owners and the countryside round about. Henry knew the Sandford and Tilson families who were in turn related to the Langhams who owned the Hall. “Taking all this information into account, Sir Frank MacKinnon, the British High Court judge and Austen scholar, suggested that Cottesbrooke was indeed the inspiration for Mansfield. Dr R. W. Chapman, the Austen scholar supreme of the early 20 th-century, published this information in 1931 in the Times Literary Supplement and seemed to agree with Sir Frank’s assessment.”

From these remarks you would say that the role of Cottesbrooke Hall as a model for Mansfield Park seems fairly certain, but Mansfield Park is described in the novel as: A spacious modern-built house, but at the time Jane Austen was writing, Cottesbrooke Hall could not be described as modern, for it was originally built in 1702, some 111 years prior to the composition of Mansfield Park. So Mansfield Park is more likely to be an amalgam of fine gentlemen’s homes and country seats, Cottesbrooke Hall included, taken from life and descriptions readily available in tour guides and other sources.

Thank you Chris for your insights into Mansfield Park – I will be posting your thoughts on Shakespeare’s influence on this novel, and your take on Mrs. Norris! Readers, please stay tuned over the next few days – you may comment below with your own thoughts or questions and Chris will get back to you.

Dear Gentle Readers: Continuing in my efforts to celebrate all things Mansfield Park through 2014, I welcome today Tony Grant, of London Calling fame, who writes on the visit to Sotherton, that all-important metaphor-filled dramatic scene in the novel where character is revealed, plot points are suggested, sides are taken, and where Fanny, in her usual state of aloneness, observes it all – Tony’s emphasis is on the concept of “improving” the estate.

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A Visit to Sotherton Court

Harlestone House, Northamptonshire, which has some of the elements of Sotherton. From Jane Austen Town and Country Style by Susan Watkins (Thames & Hudson, 1990) [from JASA website]

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Eighteenth-century gardens were not merely intended to be pretty places for listening to birdsong and observing plants and trees. Of course you could do that if you wanted to but they were much more than that. The new landscaped gardens of the 18th century “improved” nature, reflected European landscape art of the time and were spiritual and emotional places. Jane Austen, by introducing the idea that her characters in Mansfield Park should visit Sotherton and provide suggestions for the “improvement” of the landscape, was creating a situation where individuals would be able to express their “taste,” and so reveal their inner characters. This scene in Mansfield Park is full of metaphors, which indeed an 18th century landscaped garden itself would embody. At Sotherton there is the ancient Tudor mansion, dark and sombre from the past; the ancient oak avenue, about which Fanny feels so concerned, and the wilderness.

Tom Bertram, who Miss Crawford found entertaining company, decides to take off for the races at B…… Nobody expects him to return for weeks so Maria Crawford prepares herself for a less lively time at the dining table at Mansfield Park. However, no sooner had Tom Bertram left the scene but Mr Rushworth, Maria Bertram’s betrothed, appears, just returned from his own travels to visit his friend, Smith, who has had his property Compton improved by an “improver.” Mr Rushworth’s head is full of thoughts for now improving his own estate at Sotherton. This was no light matter in the 18th century. The process involved the revealing of a person’s “taste.” The concept of acquiring taste in the 18th century was a serious matter. Young men from wealthy and aristocratic families travelled Europe on what was termed the Grand Tour to finish their education and to acquire “taste” by visiting the art galleries of Europe and visiting the houses and homes of the European aristocracy to observe all the new concepts in architecture and landscape design. The wealthy employed architects and landscape gardeners to turn their estates into examples of “taste” for them.

In the mid-18th century the social commentator George Coleman decried the great fashion of his time:

“Taste is at present the darling idol of the polite world…The fine ladies and gentlemen dress with Taste; the architects, whether Gothic or Chinese, build with Taste; the painters paint with Taste; critics read with Taste; and in short, fiddlers, players, singers, dancers, and mechanics themselves, are all the sons and daughters of Taste. Yet in this amazing super-abundancy of Taste, few can say what it really is, or what the word itself signifies.”

In Mansfield Park, it seems everybody is asked their opinion. Mr Rushworth is the only one who apparently doesn’t have a clue.

“I must try to do something with it,” said Mr Rushworth, “but I do not know what. I hope I shall have some good friend to help me.”

This is a terrible admission in the 18th – early 19th century from one who is the owner of an estate, who is wealthy, and who has apparently had all the advantages.

Miss Bertram answers him with restrained disdain,

“Your best friend upon such an occasion, said Miss Bertram, calmly, “would be Mr Repton, I imagine.”

Mrs Norris provides her view,

“Such a place as Sotherton Court deserves every thing that taste and money can do….planting and improving.”

Lady Bertram puts her view, “…..a very pretty shrubbery.”

And even, shy, mouse-like Fanny Price confidently disagrees with Mr Rushworth when he suggests that an ancient oak avenue should be cut down…

“Cut down an avenue! What a pity. Does not it make you think of Cowper? ‘Ye fallen avenues once more I mourn your fate unmerited.’”

All that poor Mr Rushworth can say meekly is, “I think I shall have Repton.”

It seems as though Mr Rushworth cannot win and the whole discussion shows him to have inferior or no taste at all. A terrible handicap.

Stoneleigh Abbey

Stoneleigh Abbey, perhaps a source for Sotherton Court, especially the Chapel scene – image from a guide book to Stoneleigh Abbey in Henley, Staffordshire, printed by Wood, Mitchell and Co Ltd. (Windows on Warwickshire website)

When everybody is at Sotherton the unsuitableness of the house and its estate is apparent:

“Henry Crawford was looking grave and shaking his head at the windows. Every room on the west front looked across a lawn to the beginning of the avenue immediately beyond tall iron palisades and gates.”

There is a lengthy discussion about how they are to tour the estate. Carriages are suggested and who is going to go with whom and which horses should be used is detailed, and Mrs Norris fusses at her fussiest best:

“Mrs Norris was beginning to arrange by what junction of carriages and horses most could be done, when the young people, meeting with an outward door, temptingly open on a flight of steps which led immediately to turf and shrubs and all the sweets of pleasure grounds, as by one impulse, one wish for air and liberty, all walked out.”

And they all emerged into the wilderness. It is strange, but from this point onwards all thought of “improvements” seems to dissipate. Well, apart from one lame joke:

“Mr Crawford was the first to move forward (Where did they think they were? An alien planet?)to examine the capabilities of that end of the house.”

This is so corny. Jane must have had a chuckle to herself over that pun.

Mr Rushworth at the gate – CE Brock (Mollands)

For most of the time in the wilderness Fanny is abandoned. She interacts, first with Edmund and Maria Crawford, when they are “clumped” together like a copse of trees; but Edmund and Miss Crawford wander off leaving her alone. Mr Crawford, Miss Bertram and Mr Rushworth then meet her, but Mr Rushworth returns to the house to get the key to let them out of the locked gate that leads from wilderness to the park beyond. Mr Crawford and Miss Bertram, impatient, wander off too and find their own way into the park and aim for a grassy knoll where they can get a better overview of the “situation.” Fanny sits worrying about everybody. There seems to be a loss of etiquette and social standards. There is a sense of the loosening of society’s usual rules. The very name “wilderness” suggests biblical references and a wild place of danger. There are unlocked doors, locked gates, iron fences, hidden barriers in the form of a ha-ha, and an open world beyond the park – a myriad of things that can be seen as psychological and social barriers as well as physical barriers.

“In the late 18th century the term ‘wilderness garden’ meant something different from what we might think of it these days in the modern world of horticulture. Inspired by the Grand Tour and the new literary form of nature poetry by Romantic poets such as Wordsworth and Coleridge, these fashionable wilderness gardens satisfied the demand for the world beyond the gate. They were tamed, but not entirely.They were a place where well-heeled ladies and gentlemen could experience a frisson from a brush with nature without ever having to stray too far from the relative safety of the English countryside. And they were a direct contrast to the formality of gardens nearer the great house where everything was managed and controlled.”[“Witley Court’s Wilderness” at English Heritage.org]

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There is a wonderful example of a “wilderness” in the grounds of Hampton Court. It is not a very large area, perhaps no larger than a cricket field, and from it you can see the Lion Gate, the palace through the trees and doorways through the surrounding brick wall into the more formal gardens. It is an area comprising a web of pathways dissecting a meadow which in the spring is carpeted with bluebells and daffodils. These untamed lawns are set beneath a woodland of apparently randomly growing trees. The area is shaded and has a feel of freedom, an untamed essence.

Hampton Court (Wikipedia)

The guide book to Hampton Court says,

“The term ‘wilderness’ refers to a place to wander, rather than an uncultivated area of garden. William III would have walked through the wilderness at Hampton Court Palace with his devoted wife Mary II. It would have comprised 18ft high hornbeam hedges, with interstices planted with elm. The Wilderness was the English version of a French ‘bosquet’. The high hedges, secluded benches and winding paths made it a place where members of the Royal Court could go for privacy and where gentlemen in particular could entertain ladies in private.”

Mr Rushworth seems to be “rushing,” to get his estate “improved,” an eagerness reflected in his wishing to marry Maria Bertram. His mother appears just as eager for him in all these aspects too. Jane Austen has chosen her character’s name carefully to fit his character. The quickest way he can think of doing it is by hiring Humphrey Repton to do all the work. This suggests that he will not and perhaps cannot contribute to the process. He wants a garden “off the peg” so to speak. Is this also a metaphor for the state of his relationship with Maria Bertram? Is she too an “off the peg” marriage? Is she too just for show? So Repton was to design his garden and Mr Crawford was to provide the requirements his future wife might want, or am I being too cruel? If this is the case he will feel no emotional attachment to his prospective wife and nor feel ownership of his garden. He wants others to be impressed by what he has, that is all. He can throw money at these projects but no ideas.

Edmund on the other hand suggests,

“…but had I a place to new fashion, I should not put myself into the hands of an improver. I would rather have an inferior degree of beauty, of my own choice, and acquired progressively. I would rather abide by my own blunders than by his.”

A much more independent view – Edmund would rather satisfy himself than others and not worry about their opinions. We can think of his future relationship with Fanny Price in these terms too.

Avenue of oak trees, cTony Grant

Fanny Price, shocked at the thought of the avenue of oaks being cut down, makes a powerful request to see them, which is a surprising demand from her. We are not used to her making demands. Perhaps this visit to Sotherton marks the rise of Fanny Price and is a pointer to the future. Oak trees are ancient trees and avenues are straight and regimented. To walk down a long avenue of trees, especially in the Spring and Summer when the foliage is at its height, provides an experience of shade and light, the rustling of leaves and the sound of birdsong but you are lead into the distance along a straight path. They are a combination of natural beauty and grace but they also provide an undeviating path. Perhaps a metaphor for Fanny Price herself, unwavering in her innocence, honesty and intelligence grounded in a strong moral foundation but also a breath of natural air. It would be a shame to cut down an avenue of oaks. They take hundreds of years to grow. They span many generations. They are an historical record and link together generations. Fanny’s sense of their worth is in contrast to Mary Crawford, whose following statement is true on one level but does not take into account that the best of the past should not only be kept but built upon:

“Every generation has its improvements.”

Part of the lake at Painshill Park, cTony Grant

The estates of the aristocracy and the wealthy in the 18th century were places designed to provide emotional experiences. The Honourable Charles Hamilton, the 9th son of the Earl of Aberavon was born in 1704. Being the 9th son he could not hope to inherit his father’s estates but through the provision of a good education, an intelligent mind, the completion of two Grand Tours, energetic ambitions and the acquisition of some well-paid government posts, he bought land at Painshill near Cobham in Surrey. His life’s work began creating a park inspired by the European artists, Nicolas Poussin, Claude Lorrain and Salvator Rosa. He succeeded magnificently and his park atPainshill has been, in recent years, renovated and is open to the public today. He created a landscape of far vistas, an undulating landscape, a strategically positioned serpentine lake, bridges, mounds, trees and woods. He created different areas that contrived different moods formed by ruined abbeys, tall turrets, Turkish tents, Gothic temples and crystal lined grottos. From the influence of Pousin’s paintings we might conjecture about the sort of parties he held inside the crystalline grottos.

Salvator Rosa

Rosa – Evening Landscape

[Images: Wikipedia]

West Wycombe Park, developed by Sir Francis Dashwood 2nd baronet between1740 and 1800, leaves us in no doubt about its purpose and uses. He famously began the Hell Fire Club in the caves of West Wyckham. He too had his temples and Palladian and Neoclassical follies based on the Italian Villas he had encountered on his Grand Tour. He spent limitless amounts of money on his park and employed three architects and two landscape gardeners. He actually employed Humphrey Repton at one stage. His park included temples to Apollo, Diana and Venus. The activities that went on in these places have been recorded and were debauched to say the least.

Humphry Repton (Wikipedia)

Who was Humphry Repton the gentleman who Mr Rushworth was intent on employing to “improve” the park at Sotherton? He was a gardening author and landscape designer. He began his career as a landscape gardener late in life at the age of 36 in 1788. He followed in the footsteps of Capability Brown who had died in 1783. Hence the pun that Jane makes in chapter 9,

“Mr Crawford was the first to move forward, to examine the capabilities of that end of the house.”

His basic theory, which he repeated on many estates, was to create a terrace near the house, and produce a serpentine park between clumps of woodland and lakes creating different views. He was accused of “advising the same thing at different places.” However, most of his work was done during the time of the Napoleonic Wars when money was not so readily at hand for the great landowners. In contrast to Capability Brown, whose landscape gardening was more creative. Repton’s designs were not as ambitious. Browns approach, continued by Repton, was to offer a variety of services. He could provide a survey and a plan for the property owner to develop themselves, or he could provide the planning service and a foreman to oversee the work, or he could oversee the work himself. He built on this process by also writing and producing what were called “The Red Books.” These were bound volumes with recommendations and included, what perhaps was most useful for the client to envisage what his estate might look like, before and after sketches. Repton was a contemporary of Jane Austen and the current popular landscape designer of the time she was writing Mansfield Park. In her choice of referring to Repton, she was right up with the latest fashions and “taste.”

Repton’s Before and After sketches (Wikipedia)

Capability Brown (Wikipedia)

Returning to Capability Brown, what is interesting is that towards the end of his career he was employed at Hampton Court as the King’s gardener. He lived in a house in the palace grounds called Wilderness House which is still there today, right next to, the Wilderness.

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And finally, as we join the Sotherton Party heading home, we discover what we really knew all along, that Mrs Norris partakes of the selfish practice of “spunging”-

“What else have you been spunging?” said Maria, half–pleased that Sotherton should be so complimented.

“Spunging, my dear! It is nothing but four of those beautiful pheasants’ eggs, which Mrs. Whitaker would quite force upon me: she would not take a denial.”

I was so delighted to hear her described that way returning after their day at Sotherton by one of the Miss Bertram’s. It might appear as spoken in a fit of pique but oh how true it is. Austen provides one or two other jokes during the visit to Sotherton, but it is this one that satisfies me the most; it describes Mrs Norris exactly.

Nicolas Poussin – Bacchanal before a herm (1632-33) – National Gallery London (Wikipedia)

Gentle Readers: I welcome today Christopher Sandrawich with his post on the JASNA tour to the UK last July 2013. Part of last year’s trip took in the Midlands, and the Jane Austen Society Midlands hosted the group for a few days… Come join Chris as they trek about Hamtsall Ridware, Stoneleigh Abbey, Chatsworth, etc. and meet the likes of Edward Cooper, Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys, John Gisborn, William Wilberforce, and more …

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Jane Austen Society North America (JASNA) UK Tour 2013

Towards the end of 2012 Hugh Whittaker, Managing Director of Pathfinders, who was organising the JASNA tour of the UK asked David Selwyn for help in the Midlands. David directed him to me for assistance and I happily pledged the full and immediate support of The Jane Austen Society Midlands. I did this in the same way that a blank cheque is signed, and if I had been aware from the outset of the full count of time and energy that was to be spent I may have been less sanguine. However, our efforts were not only well received but it was a real pleasure to meet so many enthusiastic Jane Austen lovers from the other side of ‘the pond’. In a hot July under azure skies in the lovely countryside around Hamstall it was great to talk to such a diverse bunch of warm, friendly, and keenly interested Jane Austen devotees who, “just like us”, love her novels. Their most frequent question, however, was “Where is the air-conditioning?”

Whenever I think of Americans touring any part of Europe I show my age by fondly recalling the 1969 romantic comedy, “If it’s Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium” which had as its premise the country-hopping approach of ‘Whirlwind Tours’ taking in as many cities and culture as possible in the time allowed. To see if in the intervening half-century our American visitors have adopted a more relaxed style let’s review their itinerary, or schedule, and find out:

Sunday 14th July: Arrive Heathrow, meet up and have dinner.

Monday 15th July: Coach to Stamford, and then Hamstall Ridware to hear a talk from JASM and then on to Buxton.

Thursday 18th July: Travel to Stoneleigh Abbey (guided ‘Austen Tour’ of house and view Costume Exhibition) then on to Adlestrop before going to Winchester.

Friday 19th July: Walking tour of Winchester, coach to Steventon and St Nicholas Church and hear a talk on Steventon “Then and Now” before going to Chawton Village and private tours of the House and Library. In the evening meet Hampshire members of the Jane Austen Society. Hotel in Winchester.

Saturday 20th July: Ceremony at Jane Austen’s grave, Winchester Cathedral, followed by a walk to 8 College Street. Return to Chawton for the JAS AGM, then evensong at St Nicholas Church.

Sunday 21st July: Visit the Close of Salisbury Cathedral followed by a tour of Wilton House, Wiltshire. Journey to Bath via Lacock.

Wednesday 24th July: Travel to Brighton and tour the Royal Pavilion. Explore the campgrounds used by the militia during the Napoleonic wars. Free time to explore Brighton then to a country-house hotel for farewell dinner.

Thursday 25th July: Transport to Gatwick or Heathrow or onto London for those extending their stay.

It all seems ‘helter-skelter’ enough!

I regret that this commentary’s structure on the JASNA tour is less of a narrative and more a series of lists, like the one above.

Carol Taylor and I had arranged to meet their bus at the Shoulder of Mutton pub for refreshments, but they were delayed owing to a bizarre accident. A very large tractor and trailer ran into a ditch to avoid colliding head-on with their bus, and completely blocked the road. Anyone who has driven through those narrow country lanes can appreciate their bus driver’s reluctance to reverse for any distance. Through the use of mobile phones, help was requested and given, and after a further detour they disembarked finally, and headed inside making full use of the pub’s many facilities. They seemed pleased to have made it unharmed but were bemused by the absence of air-conditioning. Our explanations that England is seldom hot enough for long enough to warrant air-cooling, evoked a mild look of surprised consternation. In preparation we had organised a package of information for each of them which seems such a waste not to share with you in turn. Included in their package was an enlarged copy on heavy paper of Carol’s wonderful sketch of The Rectory which appears in Transactions Issue No 10 and which was very well received.

Stattfordshire, UK (Wikipedia)

I addressed the tour party and mentioned that there were several “Ridwares” in the area and this one is denoted as Hamstall Ridware. The place name comes from a Celtic word “Rhyd” meaning “Ford” and an Anglo Saxon word “Wara” meaning “Dwellers” and Hamstall Ridware is two miles north of a fording point across the River Trent. Also included (for them) was a photocopy of Edward Cooper’s likeness taken from Transactions Issue No 3 plus the following:

The Reverend Edward Cooper, first cousin to Jane Austen,
Rector of the Church of St Michael and All Angels, Hamstall Ridware

Edward and Jane were cousins because their mothers were sisters and granddaughters of Theophilus Leigh of Adlestrop.
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The Rev Cooper wrote evangelical and uncompromising sermons and he saw “eye to eye” with his Bishop, Henry Ryder.
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Voltaire said that, “Anglican clergy had no major vice save avarice” and it seems even a friendly bishop had occasion to reprimand the Reverend Edward Cooper for keeping his curate, the Reverend John Riland, at Yoxall, on a miserly stipend.
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For all Jane Austen’s seeming dislike of her cousin, and his letters of “cold comfort”, Edward Cooper made many good friends at Hamstall. Even before he and his wife had moved up from Harpsden he had befriended Edward Riley who was to be his new neighbour. By the summer of 1800, when his parents-in-law paid their first visit to Staffordshire, Cooper’s acquaintance had swelled to include the inhabitants of most of the great houses in the vicinity, as well as the clergymen of the many surrounding villages and several from the cathedral town of Lichfield, just eight miles distant. Besides the fact that he was a well-educated man, Edward Cooper was very wealthy, having inherited the fortune of his grandfather, the goldsmith and banker, Gislingham Cooper; so he would have been quite at home among the local gentry. He appears to have chosen his closest friends from among those of evangelical persuasion, some of whom had also met or were deeply interested in the life and work of Samuel Johnson. These points may be of special interest to readers of Mansfield Park.
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Adlestrop, a Cotswold Village, features the Manor House, Adlestrop Park, – which is a gothic mansion ‘improved’ by Repton – property of James Henry Leigh (the Leigh family had lots of ancestral lands). At the nearby Rectory lived the Reverend Thomas Leigh (Mrs Austen’s cousin) who on the death of his remote relative in 1806, the Honorary Mary Leigh, went to Stoneleigh Abbey in the company of Mrs George Austen with her daughters Cassandra and Jane. After the family interests were settled the Austen’s visited Hamstall Ridware and the Coopers in the late summer of 1806 and stayed about five weeks.

The proximity of church, rectory and manor house could not have escaped Jane Austen’s notice. The river and the stewponds immediately beyond the churchyard could prefigure Delaford in Sense and Sensibility. Left out of the novel is the tower, originally an outlook tower, now preserved as a ‘folly’.
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Also, we have Sense and Sensibility character names with people known to, or friends of, the Coopers: Ferrars, spelt with two “e’s” but still with an ‘F’, Dashwood, Palmer and Jennings. Also, the Austens would have passed through Middleton on their journey from Stoneleigh Abbey in Warwickshire to Hamstall, and in addition Lord Middleton was a distant relation of Mrs Austen and she, herself, was named after the sister of the first Lord Middleton – Cassandra Willoughby.

Stoneleigh Abbey was maintained and added to over time by the wealth of the Leigh family and has an odd mix of styles: it has an Elizabethan East Wing, an 18th Century West Wing and a 14th Century Gate House. Its rooms are altogether lighter and more colourful than one might expect – and one can easily imagine Catherine Morland having to swallow her disappointment at the shortage of Gothic Horrors.
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Just how far we can go to claiming that Stoneleigh Abbey as the model for Northanger Abbey is aided by the existence of a now concealed staircase leading from the stable yard that might have been the model for Henry Tilney to ascend and surprise Catherine when she was seeking Mrs Tilney’s bedroom.
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What is more credible is the chapel at Stoneleigh Abbey being the model for the chapel at Sotherton Court in Mansfield Park. From the vantage point of the chapel balcony one sees, “the profusion of mahogany and the crimson velvet cushions appearing over the ledge of the family balcony above” and as Fanny Price noted, “no aisles, no inscription, no banners.”
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Despite all of this the wall-plaque at Stoneleigh Abbey misspells the Austen name!
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John and Millicent Gisborne were close friends of Edward Cooper. They lived at Holly Bush, a beautiful and commodious house at Newborough in Needwood Forest, just two miles from Hamstall and a mile from Yoxall Lodge, the home of John’s older brother. A deeply religious man, John Gisborne shared with Edward Cooper more than their evangelical persuasion. They read the same books, Edward Cooper sometimes guiding his friend in the choice of reading matter and discussing it with him during long walks in the forest. The younger Gisborne had inherited from his mother a keen interest in botany, which he pursued with unabated vigour all his life, corresponding with most of the leading botanists of the day. He married the step-daughter of Erasmus Darwin. (Scientist, inventor, poet, and physician at Lichfield, Darwin was co-founder of the Lunar Society in Birmingham. The experiments, discoveries and inventions of this group of men did much to advance the industrial revolution in England.) Darwin’s own interest in botany, and the many thoughts his own experiments and discoveries gave rise to, he put into verse in his much-celebrated, sometimes controversial Botanic Garden, which Mrs. Lybbe Powys mentions in her journal. Darwin’s son-in-law, John Gisborne, wrote two poems which won him some acclaim. They are partly a celebration of Nature, but, as in the poetry of his brother, Erasmus Darwin, and of William Cowper, the poet so much loved by the Evangelicals, he reveals the extent to which his peaceful contemplation in the wild led to reflection on greater issues. Among those that are mentioned in John Gisborne’s Vales of Weaver is the subject of Catherine the Great, whose ‘wickedness’ included the enslavement of the Poles. Gisborne, contrasts the Empress of Russia with “Immortal Washington … Saviour of his Country, the Supporter of Freedom, and the Benefactor of Mankind.”
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Slavery was almost an obsession with Edward Cooper’s friends at that time, and small wonder, for William Wilberforce had

William Wilberforce

spent many an autumn with the Gisbornes at Yoxall Lodge engaged in abolition work. He and Gisborne had been at Cambridge together and had shared much companionable conversation late into the night. However, they had parted company after graduation and only resumed contact when Gisborne heard that Wilberforce had taken up the issue of the slave trade in the House of Commons. He promptly wrote to Wilberforce: “I have been as busy in town as a member of Parliament preparing himself to maintain the Abolition of the Slave Trade, and no doubt much more usefully employed. I shall expect to read in the newspapers of your being carbonaded by West Indian planters, barbecued by African merchants, and eaten by Guinea captains; but do not be daunted for – I will write your epitaph.” And Wilberforce was soon taking advantage of Gisborne’s quiet haven in the forest, where he and Mrs. Gisborne’s brother worked on the vast quantity of evidence on the slave trade, so as to become fully conversant with it and thereby strengthen their arguments. For much of the day they would work uninterrupted in an upper room, eating little, only coming down to walk in the forest for a half hour before dinner. There Gisborne would hear his friend’s melodious voice far away among the trees.

On one such visit Wilberforce did take time off to accompany Gisborne to Etruria to call on Josiah Wedgwood who had manufactured a jasper-ware cameo depicting a slave in chains and the words: “Am I not a man and a brother.” Had they not the anti-slavery interest in common Gisborne would have met Wedgwood through his sister-in-law. Millicent Gisborne’s step-father, Erasmus Darwin was family doctor and friend to Wedgwood, another member of the Lunar Society.

Yes, I remember Adlestrop –
The name because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop – only the nameAnd willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

I had included this poem, not only because it is both evocative and beautiful, and suitable reading on a hot English summer’s day, but because through the name, Adlestrop, we have the Theophilus Leigh connection as well as the connections with Edward Cooper’s parish and finally, JASNA were actually to go there as part of their itinerary on this tour. Nevertheless, I was still asked why it was included!

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A copy of the memorial to the Reverend Edward Cooper, with notes

IN A VAULT NEAR THIS SPOT ARE DEPOSITED
THE REMAINS OF
THE REV. EDWARD COOPER
WHO, FOR UPWARDS OF 30 YEARS WAS RECTOR
OF THIS PARISH, AND FOR MANY YEARS OF
THE ADJOINING PARISH OF YOXALL ALSO;
IN BOTH WHICH PLACES, (AS A FAITHFUL
MINISTER OF CHRIST,
AND ENDEARED TO ALL HIS PARISHIONERS,)
HE DISCHARGED, WITH UNREMITTING ZEAL,
THE DUTIES OF HIS SACRED OFFICE

HE WAS THE ONLY SON
OF THE REV. EDWARD COOPER L.L.D.
VICAR OF SONNING, BERKS &c. AND PREBENDARY
OF BATH AND WELLS; AND OF JANE HIS WIFE,
GRANDAUGHTER OF THEOPHILUS LEIGH ESQ
OF ADDLESTROP, IN THE COUNTY OF GLOUCESTER
HE WAS FORMERLEY
FELLOW OF ALL SOULS COLLEGE, OXFORD
HE WAS FATHER ALSO.
HE DEPARTED THIS LIFE, ON 26 DAY OF FEB 1833
IN THE 63rd YEAR OF HIS AGE.

“HE BEING DEAD YET SPEAKETH”

WITHIN THE SAME VAULT ALSO REPOSE THE
REMAINS OF CAROLINE ISABELLA, HIS WIDOW,
ONLY DAUGHTER OF PHILIP LYBBE POWYS, ESQ
OF HARDWICK HOUSE IN THE COUNTY OF OXFORD,
SHE DIED IN THE 63rd YEAR OF HER AGE.

THIS TABLET WAS ERECTED BY THEIR EIGHT SURVIVING
CHILDREN, AS A TRIBUTE OF
GRATEFUL AFFECTION, AND RESPECT,
TO THE MEMORY OF THEIR
DEEPLY LAMENTED, AND MUCH BELOVED
PARENTS

On her visit to her cousin Edward Cooper, in the summer of 1806, Jane Austen would have been familiar with the Church of St Michael and All Angels, Hamstall Ridware. The historic church, dating in part from the 12th Century, stands beside the Rectory on the beautiful site overlooking the River Blythe.

St Michael and All Angels, Hamstall Ridware (Wikipedia)

This memorial on the east wall of the north aisle of his Church, reveals Edward Cooper’s connection with the Leighs of Adlestrop. The Jane Austen Society Midlands provided funds to have the tablet cleaned and the letters re-blacked. On Sunday, 16th August, 1998 one of the two hymns written by Edward Cooper was sung when the retiring vicar, the Revd, F Finch, rededicated the memorial.

Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys and Jane Austen were contemporaries and this alone makes her diaries fascinating; however, she has another claim on our interest. She was an old friend of Mrs George Austen and her only daughter, Caroline, married Mrs Austen’s nephew, the Reverend Edward Cooper. A point to note is that “Lybbe” is one of Caroline’s husband’s given names, or Christian names as they were then known, and NOT part of his surname. [To avoid confusion please visit: The Persistence of a Genealogy Error, The Evidence, and What Really Happened at the Powys-Lybbe ancestry site: http://www.tim.ukpub.net/jane_austen_soc/index.html ]

Hardwick House is in Whitchurch, near Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire. In 1909 Hardwick House was bought by Charles Day Rose, and they are both said to be models for “Toad of Toad Hall” although there are other claimants for E H Shepard’s and Kenneth Grahame’s inspirations. In the diaries of Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys there is an entry for Jan 1776, when Jane was less than a month old, which gives first hand information on Oxfordshire, England of the time.

“The most severe frost in my memory began January 7th and lasted till February 2nd. It began to snow about two in the morning as we were returning from a ball at Southcote, and kept snowing for twelve days, tho’ none fell in quantities after the first three days, but from the inconvenience from that on the ground was soon very great, as strong north-east winds blew it up in many places twelve or thirteen foot deep, so that numbers of our cottagers on the common were oblig’d to dig their ways out, and then hedges, gates and stiles being invisible, and all the hollow ways levelled, it was with vast difficulty the poor men could get to the village to buy bread; water they had none, but melted snow for a long time – and wood could not be found – a more particular distress in Oxfordshire, as our poor have always plenty of firing for little trouble.

She goes on to describe the trials and tribulations generally but specifically mentions,

“Two hundred and seventeen men were employed on the Oxford Turnpike between Nettlebed and Benton to cut a road for carriages, but then a chaise could not go with a pair of horses, and very dangerous like driving on glass. A wagon loaded with a family’s goods from London was overturned, a deal of damage done to china &c, but ‘tis astonishing any one would venture to send goods is such a time, or venture themselves”

Several ideas occur on reading this. They kept late hours when going to a dance. The “inclosures” of the commons had not started or reached that part of Oxfordshire yet. The British are never ready for snow – no matter what sort, how much or how little – or when. However, when snow brought England to a silent halt and so most journeys were planned for the summer, in Russia the converse applied as travelling in summer on muddy byways with bogged down carriages was impossible, but the winter snow with sleds made travel for pleasure and business not only possible, but quick and easy. Jane Austen loved Shakespeare and my favourite quotation comes from Hamlet, “Nothing is either good or bad but thinking makes it so”, and snow provides a wonderful example of why this is true. The English look out on the freshly fallen deep drifts and say, “Bother! We are stuck inside” the Russians look out and say, “Great! We can go somewhere!” (In Russian, of course!)

The diary entries that mention the Coopers or Hamstall Ridware are as follows:

14th March 1793:was the day our dear Caroline was married to Mr Cooper, son of the late Dr Cooper, of Sonning, Berks, a match that gave all her friends the highest satisfaction, as there cannot be a more worthy young man. We had all intended to have the ceremony perform’d in London, but found some difficulties about residence, parish, &c., so are determin’d to have it at Fawley; so sent to our son Thomas not to come up, but to meet us there, with Phil and Louisa. I was so affected by the loss of my dear girl (who till latterly I had never parted with for even one night) that I dreaded how I would behave at the time. They all persuaded me not to go with her; so her father, Mr Cooper, and herself went to Fawley the day before, and the ceremony was over before any but our own family knew that it was to be performed there. And Tom, who had been all the week before in parties in our large neighbourhood, was afterwards complimented at keeping a secret even better than a lady! As soon as it was over, Mr Powys and Tom set off for London, and Phil and Louisa for Hardwick, the bride and groom for Sonning.

27th October 1794:Our dear Caroline brought to bed of a son

3rd December 1794:Edward Philip Cooper was christened at Harpsden Church (Mr Cooper then in holy orders, was curate at Harpsden for the Rev Thomas Leigh, rector who was non-resident). My mother, Mr Powys, Mrs Williams and Mr Henry Austen, sponsors. He had been half-christened before.

2nd February 1795:On the 11th managed to drive to Harpsden to see my Caroline, as we had never met since the 23rd December.

25th February 1795 the Fast:My brother being in residence at Bristol, our son, Mr Cooper, preach’d. The frost had lasted eleven weeks on the fast-day.

1st January 1796: At the christening of Isabella Mary (Cooper), at Harpsden, myself and Mrs Leigh godmothers, Dr Powys godfather. Stayed to dinner and supper; not home till two in the morning. Weather very different from last year; quite mild, had no frosts but high winds and rain.

6th July 1796: Stayed with Caroline, Mr Cooper being gone to London to meet his brother, Captain Williams, who soon after had the honour of being knighted by his Majesty for his gallant behaviour at sea.

27th March 1797: Caroline and Cooper went to London to Sir Thomas Williams, to see his new ship, the Endymion, launched

19th December 1797: I went to Harpsden. Mr Powys and Tom went to Bletchingdon Park to shoot, and were robbed by a highwayman only four miles from Henley, on the Oxford Road, just at three o’clock. We hear the poor man was drowned the week after, by trying to escape, (after having robbed a carriage), through some water which was very deep. He behaved civilly, and seemed as he said, greatly distress’d.

23rd December 1797: Edward drove Caroline and myself to Reading in the tandem.

29th January 1798: The Gentlemen’s Club. Caroline and I met the Fawley Court family at the Henley play. All the gentlemen came to the farce; a very full house, and better performers than one could have imagined. “The Jew” and “The Poor Soldier”. The company put £100 into the Henley Bank to answer any demands upon them, and as a surety of their good behaviour. Rather unusual for strollers in general.

14th August 1798: . . .At Canterbury . . . . We were so alarm’d for our dear Cooper (This happened at Newport, Isle of Wight) whose health had been so bad for some time, and who was one of the most affectionate of brothers, that we were quite miserable, and wrote immediately to Caroline that, if they the least wished it, we would return immediately after we received their next letter, and, as that must be some days coming, we were greatly distress’d and hardly knew how to manage, as the very next day had been some time fixedon for us all to set out for our intended tour through the Isle of Thanet;. . . . . . . .

21st August 1798: . . . . . . I had received a letter from Caroline to insist on our not shortening the time of our return, as his (Cooper’s) health was tolerable . . . . . . .

25th August 1798: I could not resist adding this description of what Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys as hostess for her bachelor brother-in-law the Dean of Canterbury provided for dinner for Prince William of Gloucester, nephew of George III, when he visited Kent in the summer of 1798. On this Saturday they sat down fourteen at a table to eat: Salmon Trout Soles, Fricando of Veal, Vegetable Pudding, Raised Giblet Pie, Chickens, Muffin Pudding, Ham, Curry of Rabbits Soup, Preserve of Olives, Open Tart Syllabub, Haunch of Venison, Three Larded Sweetbreads, Raised Jelly, Maccaroni, Peas, Potatoes, Buttered Lobster, Baskets of Pastry, Goose, Custards.

30th January 1799:Went from Hardwick, to stay with Caroline, while Cooper went into Staffordshire to see his living at Hamstall Ridware, that Mrs Leigh (from the Leighs of Addlestrop, Gloucestershire, and Stoneleigh, Warwickshire. Cooper’s mother was a Miss Leigh) had just been so kind as to present him to. The roads were so bad with snow and frost, we were obliged to go round by Caversham, but got safe to Harpsden to dinner.

1st February 1799: It continued snowing, and was so deep we were much alarmed for Cooper on his journey, as he had promised to write; but the Oxford mail had been stopped that day, a circumstance that had not happened for thirteen years.

3rd February 1799: Snow continued, but we were happy in having a letter from Cooper to say he was got safe back to Oxford, having been forced to walk many miles, and hoped by the same method he might be able to get home the next evening. There was no church on the Sunday at Harpsden or Fawley, as no one could get to either. The icicles on the trees hanging down was a most beautiful sight, when the sun shone on them.

4th February 1799: A hard frost. Cooper came by the Oxford stage.

23rd September 1799: Caroline and Cooper went to his new living in Staffordshire for a few days to furnish the house; the four children and two maids came to us. They had been staying the week at the Hall’s, Harpsden Court, previously. .Sunday September 13th was to me one of the most melancholy days I ever experienced, as it was to part me and my dearest Caroline, who was to set off the next day for Staffordshire; and as Mr Cooper was to do duty at Henley Church that day for Mr Townsend, he thought it best they should all lay at Henley, to make the separation less dismal. They would not stay to breakfast, but set off as soon as they got up. The dear little children stay’d till after morning church, and not knowing or feeling any of the anxiety that we did, seem’d perfectly astonished to see us shed tears, and that we did not feel equal pleasure with themselves at the idea of their journey.

7th July 1800: . . . . . . . From hence we went to dinner at Lichfield, where Mr Cooper sent a servant to meet us, with the key of a gentlemen’s grounds, going through which shortened our way to Hamstall Ridware, where we got to tea. Cooper had walked about a mile from their house on our arrival, at which our dear Caroline ran out to meet us; but after so many months’ absence, she and myself were so overcome, that strangers might have supposed it a parting scene, instead of a most joyful meeting; but my sorrow was soon turned to its contrast, to find them all so well, and pleasantly situated.

9th July 1800: In the evening we went a trout-fishing on the Blythe, a river running at the bottom of a meadow before their house.

10th July 1800: Walk’d up the village to Smith’s the weaver, to see the manner of that work, and ‘tis really curious to see with what astonishing velocity they threw the shuttle. (Power-looms were not introduced till 1807; the shuttle was then thrown, and batten worked by hand.) Hamstall Ridware Church is a rectory dedicated to St Michael, a very neat old spire building of stone, having two side aisles, chancel &c., and makes a magnificent appearance as a village church.

21st July 1800: That evening we all walk’d up to Farmer Cox’s, a very fine high situation, and most extensive views; indeed the prospect all round Hamstall is delightful.

22nd July 1800: We took a long hot walk to the village of Murry, to see a tape manufactury, of which seven gentlemen of the neighbourhood are proprietors. The noise of the machinery is hardly to be borne, tho’ the workpeople told us they themselves hardly heard the noise! Such is use! The calendering part is worth observation, as the tapes all go through the floor of an upper room, and when you go down to the apartment under it, you see them all coming through the ceiling, perfectly smooth and glossy, where the women take them, and roll them in the pieces as we buy them at the haberdasher’s, whereas in the upper room they all looked tumbled and dirty.

28th July 1800: We all set out early in the morn to see Shuckborough, Mr Anson’s, and Hagley, Lord Curzon’s. We went through Blythberry and Coulton, the latter a village rather remarkable for many of its cottages being built in a marl-pit with woods over it, the roots of its trees growing and hanging loosely over their little gardens, which are deck’d with all manner of flowers, and kept with the greatest neatness.

12th August 1800: All our party went a trout-fishing, but the heat was so intense it was hardly bearable.

13th August 1800: Mr Cooper and Mr Powys, went to the assizes at Stafford. On their return they entertain’d us with a droll copy of verses on Lord Stafford’s picture being hung up in the town-hall in 1800:-

“With happy contrivance to honour his chief,
Jack treats his old friend as he treats an old sheep
But with proper respect to the garter and Star,
Instead of the gallows he’s hung at the bar
To remove from this county so foul a disgrace,Take down the old Peer, and hang Jack in his place”

[Jack is a Mr Sparrow] – [Ed. Is this perchance a Johnny Depp sighting in 1800?]

14th August 1800: I walked down to the river Blithe by seven in the morn to see Caroline and the three eldest children bathe, which they did most mornings, having put up a dressing house on the bank.

18th August 1800: We all passed a dull gloomy day, the following one being upon fixed for leaving our dear relatives. We reached Fawley on Wednesday the 20th by seven o’clock.

7th January 1801: Caroline Cooper was brought to bed of a boy (on my birthday). He was christened Frederick Leigh Cooper.

3rd May 1801: Our son Cooper preached, as Caroline, himself, and family came to stay with us the week before.

27th May 1801: The Coopers, to our inexpressible grief, set out with their five dear children to Staffordshire.

12th August 1802: After breakfast we set out thro’ Coventry by Kenilworth to Lichfield, where we dined, and reached Hamstall by tea-time, finding all the family (Coopers) perfectly well . . . . . . . . . we returned to Fawley on September 9th

2nd August 1803: Mr Powys and I set out for our son Cooper’s in Staffordshire, and reached Hamstall on the 3rd about six. Had the inexpressible joy to see Cooper, Caroline, and their six dear children in perfect health.

5th March 1805: Our grandson Warren Cooper, born.

12th August 1805: Mr Powys and myself set off for our son Cooper’s in Staffordshire. We hired a post-chaise for the time at a guinea a week, of Hicks, coachmaker in the Fair Mile (at Henley on Thames)

14th August 1805: We went out most mornings and evenings in the two donkey-chaises – very clever vehicles indeed. Caroline drove one, and little Edward was so pleased at being postillion to grandmamma, that. Though I sometimes drove myself, he most days rode my donkey, the carriages only holding one person each.

Monday the 26th had been for some time fixed on for us to go to Matlock and Dove Dale. We set out a party of seven; we went through Blithbury and Abbots Bromley. We got to the Rev Mr Stubbs’ at Uttoxeter by half-past one, who asked us to dine with him. We went to see the church, rather an extraordinary one, very ancient, and the pews so oddly managed (This was the case at Shiplake Church, Oxon, before the restoration of 1870. The seats in the first pews in the chancel had to be lifted up to admit persons to the seats behind.) as three or four go through each other, and so narrow that, if those belonging to the outward ones happen to come first, without they are the most slender persons, it’s impossible to pass each other. Caroline and myself, who are not so could not help laughing and saying it was lucky we did not belong to this church . . . . . . .

September 1805: Mr Powys and myself left Hamstall, to return to Fawley. A dismal parting as usual

[Note: A criticism often levelled at Jane Austen’s writing is that topical events of the time get little or no mention. Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys was an inveterate diarist and in her earlier entries there is mention of Nelson’s father whom she met in the late 1790’s but Nelson’s greatest victory which cost him his life is not mentioned at all in the collation of her diary entries prepared by Emily J Climenson. This important victory was such a decisive action in the wars against France and Spain, and we can only speculate on reasons why The Battle of Trafalgar 21st October 1805 is not mentioned even in passing. Mrs Lybbe Powys was a close friend of Mrs Cassandra Austen, and Edward Cooper was first cousin not only to Jane Austen but to Charles and Francis Austen who were Captains in the Royal Navy, and Francis was actually in Nelson’s Fleet but missed the action as he was away in the Mediterranean sent for fresh fruit and water. So as well as the interest this had to the nation, Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys had these added personal connections, but it still doesn’t impact on her everyday life so that it rates a mention in her diary? Does the absence of world affairs in Austen’s novels reflect a similar parochial view on life in England at that time, or alternatively does it just reflect the manners and interests of the time? “A woman’s place?”]

14th July 1807:Cooper, Caroline, their eight children, Mrs Morse the governess, and two servants came from Staffordshire to Hardwick

31st July 1807: Mr Powys and myself went to Hardwick to see the Coopers; the children in high spirits with their five Hardwick cousins, so only saw thirteen together, as Tom’s were not there. The Coopers came to us afterwards.

1st October 1807: Our dear Caroline Cooper and children set off for Staffordshire.

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Extracts taken from the diaries of Mrs Philip Lybbe Powys and any notes I have added appear “not in italics”.

The visiting party asked many questions and this completed the information exchanges at Hamstall Ridware, although the Reverend Ty Leyland had also organised talks on the history and architecture of the church and its locality, which were also listened to with great interest.

Chatsworth = ?Pemberley (Wikipedia)

Hil Robinson and I met the party again at Buxton later that day for dinner and conversation. Later in the week Jack and Jan Barber (with Hil and I again) met their party at Chatsworth for cream tea in the Palladian Stables (not a horse in sight) and I entertained the gathered party with my views on whether Chatsworth was in Jane Austen’s mind as the model for Pemberley. This has featured as a talk at our own AGM and my ideas are set out in full elsewhere in Transactions. [Ed. This talk will be posted here once it is published in JASM’s Transactions, so stay tuned….]

The Jane Austen Society Midlands was thanked most warmly for their company and for sharing views on all things Austen with the Jane Austen Society of North America tour party.

Chris Sandrawich, July 2013

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Thank you Chris for this informative [and entertaining!] post on all things Jane Austen and the Midlands – I am, as always, green with Envy! I have travelled quite a bit in the UK, but alas! not much in the Midlands … one of these days! I am inspired to read all of Caroline Powys’ diaries [albeit noting that Deirdre Le Faye in Jane Austen’s Letters advises caution in using these often inaccurate diaries edited by Climenson], but (in following Jane Austen’s own criticisms) Edward Cooper’s sermons, maybe not so much…

Update: please see the comment below from Ron Dunning re: the Tylney-Long connection – I include here his genealogy chart: